PRESIDENTIAL EVALUATION IN CONTEXT OF 360 ° EVALUATION

Discussion took place on presidential evaluation in the context of college and 360° evaluation.

Bob Wax said the concept of 360° evaluation is about servicing customers, boss, peers, and connections. You ask everyone you service if you've done a good job, then you are able to get 360° perspective of how you are doing. There are an infinite number of spokes. There should be talk about both the president and the college as a whole-the staff, faculty, Board, alumni, and students--all have customers and can be measured in how they relate in different areas. We must understand fixture impact for existing in the future, the long-range implications. We can quantify certain areas. We need to evaluate everyone at Goddard and everyone should take part in the evaluation process. While the position of president was used for the purposes of discussion, this concept is equally applicable for faculty and staff positions.

Paul noted that the goal to talk about 360° evaluation was not to complete a process but take a first step. The Board does not anticipate that we come out of this meeting with a set structure for the evaluation process. He would like to see a mechanism for dialogue, with something coming back to board as a first step with a sense of structure that would supplement what was done in the past. He noted that the Presidential search committee suggested Bob, Lois, Margo come up with something, but this hasn't happened. The Committee does have a draft of a process that needs to be fine-tuned, that document can continue as part of the conversation. The presidential search committee can be reconstituted somewhat to take the present document and start the conversation and to talk with President Mossberg resulting in concrete suggestions for the Board.

Paul noted that since the search committee is not functional at the moment he suggests an ad hoc committee of five people, including President Mossberg, to look at the documents as they currently exist and to look at Margo's document. The five-member committee will consist of Jen Pia, Steve Schapiro, Lois Sontag, Frances Malgeri and President Mossberg. The charge of this Committee will be to look at all these reports with President Mossberg taking into account making sure that her ideas and values are integrated into the report. The committee will report back to the Board or the Executive Committee when ready but no later than the next Board meeting. The committee should send the report to the Board via e-mail at least one month in advance of the Board meeting in order to have feed back.

GOAL SETTING:

There was further discussion by the Board on goal setting for the college.

The Board requested a sense from President Mossberg about the process of goal setting. President Mossberg said that the criteria must be measured to be effective; they must translate to specific benchmarks. This is a clear criteria for measurement, in her view she must:

1. Re-establish the role of the President at Goddard. [emphasis mine] In the past it has been understood that the person or presence that makes bad things happen is the President. She believes there should be a shifting, the role of good things happening. There is a vacuum in the role and the structure. Where is the role of President? There are presently defensive structures made to keep President out.

2. Establish proactive responses and play a proactive role.

3. Establish a responsibility to the community to articulate a vision and the ways we each contribute to it.

4. Talk about the whole that is a complex and difficult concept. It will be difficult to put into place, to understand what we mean by whole.